Exhibition

Windows to Childhoods

Children want to play. If they don’t have a backyard, they’ll invent one. In want of material, they transform things.

Thus, girls play hopscotch on desks with their fingertips in Minas Gerais. In Espírito Santo, boys turn manioc root into airplanes. In Bahia’s Recôncavo region, flip-flops and a plastic bag are enough to make a sailboat. A tin can becomes a car. A corncob becomes a cow. A stone serves as a stove, and wood, a horse.

The “Play Trails,” exhibition, open at SESC Santo André until July 28, unites a collection of these toys and games from children all over Brazil. The exhibition first emerged in Santos (SP), as a fruit of the Mapa do Brincar (Play Map) project.

In Santo André, the exhibit space was transformed into a giant warehouse for toys, which are presented in their process of creation in backyards across the country. Little bits of memory and nature are combined with games and toys made (or invented) by the kids of today and yesterday.

While they investigate how the soapbox cars on display were made, children and adults alike see reflections of their own childhood, comparing, remembering and becoming inspired. And they spy other childhoods through “windows,” which are photos of children playing outdoors, framed to look like landscapes seen from a window.

There are even hanging monocles, through which you can observe toy cars, spintops, boats and other toys that are a combination of nature and children’s daily lives. The set of the exhibition was designed by Marisa Bentivegna.

“More than the toys themselves, the exhibition is about the play of building,” said Gabriela Romeu, curator in collaboration with Renata Meirelles. “It’s the process that’s on display. For this reason, we provided evidence of the process in several display cases: pieces of a top (from tree branch to finished toy) alongside tools like sickles and machetes, or a leather boot next to a slingshot, since boys cut pieces from old boots to make part of this toy. What we really want is for other kids to understand how they were made,” she added.

At the end of the exhibit, photos illustrate children playing with the toys they built. One of the highlights is a football set made in the Cariri region of Ceará, with used vaccine vials standing in as players.

Together with childhood researchers Gandhy Piorski, Marlene Peret and Selma Maria, the curators toured Brazil collecting materials and contraptions from every corner of the country: toys from the Roseano backlands, Jequitinhonha Valley, Middle Xingu River, the Amazon, Ceará, Bahia and Espírito Santo, among others.

They also brought back the language of play. It is heard in verses embroidered on pillows for visitors to rest on, flowers that sing songs as you turn a handle, videos shown in a tiny theater, hidden inside a large tree trunk, and clouds that can be reached by climbing a ladder.

Each visitor who takes the Play Trails journey receives a travel notebook, featuring delicate drawings by Biba Rigo. The notebook teaches games, verses, toys like cloth shuttlecocks, tamancas (flip-flop sailboat) and nail-board football, and provides space for readers to write about how they play.

Memories are connected to childhood through all five senses: by stepping foot on the sandy backyard the entire SESC Santo André was transformed into, touching soil, listening to cartoonist Laerte, writer Heloisa Prieto and illustrator Fernando Villela, among others, describe their favorite childhood games and by drinking “Sun” (orange) and “Rain” (grape) juice at the end of the visit.

Childhood is not packaged in neat boxes. Play Trails is more about sharing than theorizing. It doesn’t look at children, it looks with them by inviting visitors into the circle: spinning round and round on a giant bobbin, jumping rope, elastic or hopscotch (which can be drawn on the ground with chalk), pushing boats along on the water. Trying out other childhoods and reconnecting with their own. Being moved. Seeing things with new eyes, like children do.

Text: Gabriella Mancini

Photos: Samuel Macedo